


Aleatory

by ltgmars



Category: Arashi (Band)
Genre: Childhood Friends, Homophobia, M/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-13
Updated: 2010-01-13
Packaged: 2017-10-26 00:17:56
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,720
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/276461
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ltgmars/pseuds/ltgmars
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>AU. For once, Sho and Ohno decide not to go on their annual summer vacation. And in the mind-numbing process of not going anywhere and not doing anything, they end up meeting Nino.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Aleatory

**Author's Note:**

> I have no idea how it got to be this long. And melodramatic. Shoo.

_aleatory (adj.): happening, done, etc. without being planned in advance_

  
**one.**

Ohno Satoshi was about as smart as you would expect any eight year old to be. He was average at grammar, average at math, average at science, average at history. He was apparently a little above average at art, having recently started what looked to be a lifelong love affair with doodling all over things that didn't belong to him, but on the whole, he was pretty standardly average.

Of course, for Sho, who already had his hands and feet planted firmly on the escalator up to Keio -- yeah, _that_ Keio -- average wasn't good enough. So it was with displeasure, but mostly with haughty indifference, that Sho allowed himself to be introduced to Ohno.

Sho's mother scooted him forward with her perfectly manicured hands on his shoulders. "Ohno-san, this is my son, Sho."

"Hello my name is Sakurai Sho nice to meet you," Sho said blandly, punctuating his automatic greeting with an automatic bow. He was no stranger to meeting new acquaintances. He just wished he didn't have to be friendly with them.

"Nice to meet you, Sho-chan," Ohno's mother replied sweetly. Sho's mouth twitched at the honorific. "This is my son, Satoshi."

Ohno said nothing, simply staring at Sho's left eye and blinking rapidly. Sho wondered what was wrong with him. After an extended moment of awkward silence and more rapid blinking, Ohno's mother shoved Ohno into a bow with a hand at the back of his head, nodding pleasantly at Sho's mother.

Ohno tried again with, "I'm Satoshi, nice to meet you," mumbled into his collar. Ohno's mother seemed satisfied enough, so with a grunt of approval she let him up for air.

  
After their mothers escaped to a park bench to get to know each other and talk about "old lady things," as Ohno's mother said with a kind smile that to Sho reeked of condescension, Sho and Ohno were left in the sandbox -- the _sandbox_ , like they were four and not seven and eight, almost adults at this point -- to discover the true meaning of friendship.

Sho didn't like to play in sandboxes. They got his clothes dirty, and the sand got stuck in funny places. Even so, he could appreciate nice, smooth castle walls and dangerous moats filled with Lego heroes desperately swimming away from giant 50-foot alligators -- no, crocodiles were scarier, right? Yeah, crocodiles sounded better! -- but eh, he was over it. He'd long transcended his wild, unkempt youth.

Scrunching the smooth sand between his fingers, Sho sighed loudly. Waited. Sighed loudly again. No response. Put some energy into it, and more growled than sighed. Still nothing.

He looked over at Ohno, who was busy burying his own foot with a shovel and pail. "You don't talk much, do you?"

Ohno looked up at him and punched him in the face.

"Wh-What was that? You're such a... a booger!" He was at a loss for words. Honest.

Ohno's eyes widened in alarm. "You don't like kung-fu movies?"

"Even if I did, I don't want to be hit in the face by someone I just met!"

"Ah." Ohno's puffy cheeks filled with understanding. "Mina-neechan hits me all the time, but I guess that's because she knows me, huh?"

At that moment, Sho reevaluated. Ohno wasn't your average eight year old after all. He was a lot stupider than that.

  
**two.**

By the time Sho was eight, he had gotten used to having Ohno around the house. It wasn't like he was particularly attached to the boy, really, but he knew that Ohno's quiet fidgeting and doodling during Sho's piano lessons was better than what most kids their age could offer.

Their mothers had, unexpectedly, seemed to take a liking to each other. Sho's mom was pretty stressed and uptight sometimes, but Mrs. Ohno was always smiling and playing video games, and she liked to laugh -- this high, clear laugh, like wind chimes. Admittedly, Sho had gotten to be pretty fond of her, too.

On days that Sho didn't have lessons of some kind, and even on days that he did, Sho's mom liked to shuck him off to the Ohnos. It started one day in the fourth grade, pretty soon after Sho's mother had taken on the department chair's position at the university. Ohno, Mrs. Ohno, and Sho walked to the Ohnos' house that afternoon, Ohno's hand swinging lightly in Mrs. Ohno's one hand, Sho's hand crushed mercilessly in the other. "It's more fun to walk this way, Sho-kun." She smiled, and his hand relaxed, because if Mrs. Ohno said so, then that's just how it was.

Soon enough, Sho was a regular guest at the Ohnos' house. He was usually stuck learning and then explaining fifth-grade math to Ohno after he got done with his own homework, but somewhere along the way he'd stopped minding. Ohno's grades took a leap for the better -- not that that was saying much, considering what his grades _had_ been. But Mrs. Ohno was pleased to have Sho around, and Sho beamed when she said so, patting him fondly on the head. Ohno looked happier, too, or at least he'd stopped running around wildly and slamming into Sho for no reason, so there was some marked progress there. (He still drew on the walls, though, and on his clothes, and on Sho's clothes. But looking down at the octopus with 20 tentacles creeping up Sho's pant leg, Sho figured that it wasn't his place to try and fix that.)

In the middle of a particularly frustrating study session with Pythagoras one night, Sho complained that he should get paid for tutoring Ohno. Like clockwork, Mrs. Ohno appeared at Ohno's bedroom door with cookies and tea. "Payment for your services, Sho-kun," she joked, smiling, always smiling. She eyed her son coldly. "Satoshi, be grateful that your friend hasn't given up on you the way your mother has." Ohno's look of utter heartbreak threw Sho into a fit of laughter, and Ohno's mournful wail of "It's not funny, Sho-kun!" only made it worse.

  
The first night Ohno decided that it was too late for Sho to walk back home was sometime in middle school. It was actually earlier than other nights when Sho had walked home by himself, but for some reason, Ohno was really insistent. Suspiciously so.

When Mrs. Ohno showed up at the door with cream puffs, Ohno whined to her. "Mom, tell Sho-kun that he has to spend the night tonight." Mrs. Ohno gave Sho a once-over, put the cream puffs on the table, and promptly tackled him to the floor. "Satoshi, get the spare futon!" Gracelessly face-planted against the earth-toned area rug with a middle-aged mother sitting on his back, Sho could only imagine the twinkle in Ohno's eye before the sounds of clambering footsteps zoomed out of and back into hearing range. The moment Mrs. Ohno slipped off him, he was slammed back down again, tangled up in arms and legs and a heavy comforter.

The whole operation had been flawless, and the fluid switch from mother to son was like something out of an adventure movie. "Nothing less from the Ohno family," Sho mumbled resignedly into Ohno's armpit. Ohno leaped up and joined Mrs. Ohno for a victory lap around the cream puffs, laughing and waving their arms around and yelling nonsense words joyously. Sho lifted himself into a sitting position, still buried under the futon, and laughed along with them.

  
Sho came back from the shower later to see Ohno sitting on his bed, fidgeting nervously. Sho frowned, running the towel through his hair a few more times before dropping it on the floor. "So what was it you wanted to talk about, Satoshi-kun?" Ohno didn't respond, looking down at the sketchbooks in his lap, so Sho stood in front of Ohno's bed until Ohno scooted back and gave him space to sit down.

Ohno looked at Sho briefly before depositing the sketchbooks in Sho's lap. Sho looked at Ohno, and looked at the sketchbooks, all tattered edges and smudged lettering and broken binding, and flipped one open, and stared. Sho was staring back at him. Or, well, a drawing of him was, sketched out in soft pencil with shading scribbled in. He was eating a cookie, taking notes, drinking a glass of milk, stretching, scratching his head, picking at his toenails, squinting at a book. He looked up at Ohno, who simply gestured at the other sketchbook. The drawings in this one were older, faded, the lines wobbly and unsure. But it was Sho, Sho, Sho, playing piano, standing in front of his kitchen counter, laughing.

Sho looked at Ohno, who was chewing on his bottom lip and staring at the sketchbooks in Sho's lap. He looked up. "Is it weird, Sho-kun?"

Sho breathed in and out. "Of course it's not weird." Of course it was weird. "We're best friends." They were best friends, and _still_ Ohno had never said anything about it.

Relief streamed into Ohno's eyes, and Sho felt a heavy sense of... of _something_... drop like a lead weight in his stomach. "Good. It's just-- it's you, and you're always there, and..."

"We're always together and you've got nothing better to draw, right?" Sho's smile felt strained, but Ohno didn't seem to notice.

Ohno chuckled, eyes on his hands in his lap. "Yeah, something like that."

"Draw me all you want, Satoshi-kun. But next time, tell me. It's not like you're gay or anything, so you don't have to keep it a secret from me." Sho watched as Ohno's smile faltered briefly before he laughed in agreement. "And you'll be in high school soon, so you can get a girlfriend and draw pictures of her." Ohno nodded, his eyes cast to the side.

Sho's jaw clenched. Well, crap. "Time for bed, huh?" he said brightly, throwing the sketchbooks back at Ohno and dropping to the floor to roll into the futon.

It took a moment for Ohno to turn off the nightstand lamp. Sho could hear bouncing and shuffling as Ohno got read to sleep. It sounded frustrated, defeated.

"Good night, Sho-kun." A tiny sniffle, but Sho ignored it.

"Good night, Satoshi-kun."

  
**three.**

Sho knew that he was an asshole, but he was okay with that. He was doing well in school, and he had some friends on the soccer team, which was the most popular team at their high school. He'd dated some girls who only liked him for his looks or his homework help or his money, but it got him laid more often than most guys, and he was a hero for it.

He and Ohno had begun to grow apart when Ohno entered high school, their study sessions dwindling rapidly and their sleepovers limited to just that once. And as soon as they were both in high school, they stopped seeing each other altogether. Sho had soccer practice, and Ohno had art club, and Sho was glad to have Ohno out of his hair.

He'd gotten back into the habit of walking home alone. He was used to it, since that was how it'd always been back before he'd met the Ohnos. Sometimes punks from other schools would talk to him like they knew shit, and he had no choice but to show them the light of day, you know, with his fist. And sometimes a girl would offer to walk home with him, and they'd make out behind a tree for a while. Nothing big. No one important.

  
Sho veered left one day, heading into a conbini to look at the covers of some porn mags and maybe grab some pudding. As he turned toward the magazine section, he caught a glance of Ohno's mother, thumbing through a women's fashion magazine. He started quickly toward the refrigerated foods section, rushing away before she could spot him, but...

"Ah, Sho-kun? Long time no see!"

Shit. Sho glanced up and "ah"ed back with all of the surprise of a kid who'd planned his own surprise birthday party, and bowed perfunctorily. "Good afternoon."

"You weren't trying to steal some porn magazines, were you?" _Shake your head innocently._ "Though you know what's strange is that I've never caught Satoshi with any porn magazines. You think he'd be at that age, you know?" _That's 'cause your son's a faggot, Mrs. Ohno._ "I bet he's missed seeing you. Why don't you come over this afternoon?"

_Fuck._

"Of course. I'd be happy to. I haven't seen Ohno in a while." Conniving bitch. It was a wonder that Sho had ever had a crush on her.

"Wonderful! Let me go buy some things, and we'll walk there together." She smiled. Sho nodded, unconvinced. What was so great about her smile anyway? He was glad, though, that she didn't try to hold his hand on their way to the house. She'd learned that much, at least.

  
Ohno wasn't home when Sho and Ohno's mother got there, so she had him wait in his room until he got back. Sho walked up the stairs, rapping his knuckles along the railing, and into Ohno's room.

It hadn't changed much in the time he hadn't been there. It'd only been a year or two, maybe -- he wasn't sure, and he'd stopped caring, really -- and it wasn't like people in high school changed that quickly anyway.

  
He was sitting on Ohno's bed, staring at an old picture hanging on the opposite wall -- Ohno's twelfth birthday party, the two of them standing triumphantly on top of a picnic table with barbeque sauce smeared all over both their faces -- when Ohno opened his door and stood there, shocked, hand on the doorknob.

"Sho-kun..." He had a paint mark smeared across his cheek, like green barbeque sauce, and Sho chuckled despite himself.

"Hey, Ohno. Your mom invited me over. I take it she didn't say anything downstairs?"

Ohno shook his head, still wide-eyed and panicked. He edged into his room and shut the door quietly behind him. "She said that there was a surprise waiting for me, but I thought it was food," he mumbled. He opened his mouth, closed it, opened it. Closed it again. "So... how've you been?"

Ohno was awkward, so awkward, all sad eyes and slouched posture and empty hands. He wanted to fidget, Sho could tell, but there wasn't a lot for him to do, standing there in the middle of the room. Sho sighed and patted the space next to him on the bed. Ohno looked alarmed but eventually made his way over. He sat with his back against the wall and his knees drawn up, playing with the hem of his shorts.

He looked... tired. Really, just exhausted, and confused, and lonely, and somehow, somewhere deep within him, Sho wanted to fix it. It had been a good, long while since they'd been best friends, but maybe it was instinct, or pity, or who the hell knows what. All he knew was that he hated seeing Ohno look like that, so sad like that.

"It's been a while, huh, Ohno?" He watched Ohno nod into his knees. "I take it you're still doing art club stuff?" Another nod. "I'm on the soccer team at my school, you know. I'm a starter even though I'm only a freshman." A twitch of a smile. "We're actually pretty good. We practice really hard, and we all get along really well. The captain works us to our bones, and, well, I still have to be ball bitch sometimes since I'm a freshman, but at least the upperclassmen respect me." Ohno nodded some more, a small smile edging across his cheeks. Then, nothing.

Sho sighed. "Hey, Satoshi-kun." Ohno looked up at him, and Sho punched him with all his might, squarely in the jaw. Ohno smacked violently against the wall, fell onto the bed, and rolled back up, a hand to his cheek and his eyes filling with tears. "What the hell was that, Sho-kun?!" He looked so wounded and offended and pissed off and-- and--

Sho burst into laughter. Fighting for breath, he squeezed out, "That's how you... start a conversation... right?" Wheezing, he spared a moment to look over at Ohno, who was somewhere between utter indignation and mind-blown bafflement, and Sho just tipped over, laughing endlessly into the pillow.

"What... the... FUCK!" And then Ohno was right there, pushing him, yanking at him, wrestling with him, trying to get him into a headlock, and laughing, laughing, he was _laughing_ , that stupid, amazing laugh, when was the last time he'd heard it, God he'd missed it so much, but there he was, and there they were, laughing, laughing forever, and Sho could've cried he was so happy.

There was a sharp knock on the door and the pair stopped, chests heaving, grinning at each other like idiots. Mrs. Ohno walked in with a trayful of cookies and smiled. It really was a great smile, and Sho wondered why he'd ever doubted himself. "If you boys are done destroying my house, you can help yourself to some cookies."

  
Later that night, Sho found himself flat on his back, staring at the ceiling. His fingers worked anxiously at the material of the spare futon. "Satoshi-kun," he croaked. Fabric rustled and stilled. "Look, I'm... I'm sorry about before, okay?" No movement. "It's okay with me if you're... if you're like that. If you're gay. Well, maybe not, honestly, not right now. But I'll be okay with it. Because it's you, and it doesn't change who you are, and who we are." Some more rustling. "I need you, Satoshi-kun. I'm an asshole without you."

"You're an asshole with me, too."

Sho laughed weakly. "Well, yeah. But still. You're the best best friend I've ever had, and I want you back. That is, if you'll have me."

Wind blew through the tree outside of Ohno's window, tapping the branches against the side of the house. Sho held his breath and waited for a response. Nothing.

"Satoshi-kun?"

Slowly, so slowly, a hand poked out from the blankets above Sho's head, fingers squeezing into a neat peace sign. "Don't be stupid, Sho-kun. I'm the only best friend you've ever had."

Sho smiled and reached up, wrapping Ohno's hand within both of his own. "Yeah, you're right."

  
**four.**

High school took a turn for the better once Ohno was back in Sho's life. He got into fewer fights, though some of the shitheads really were asking for it, and he stopped hooking up with random girls just because he felt like it, to the thinly veiled chagrin of said random girls. His friendship with Ohno only grew stronger, and it took what seemed to Sho to be a surprisingly short amount of time to reconcile the fact that his best friend was gay. It really didn't change who he was, after all, and really, anyone -- guy or girl -- would be lucky to have him.

Sho's life, it seemed, was sorting itself out quite nicely. The escalator up to Keio had served him well, and he was only a few short months from sweet, sweet matriculation after years of hard work and diligence. His soccer team won second place in the prefectural tournament, and in impossibly high spirits, Sho had treated them all to yakisoba. His father had yelled at him later, stern index finger waving like the instrument that would pen his death sentence, but his mother came to the rescue and insisted that they all be proud of him for his hard work for three years.

Even Sho's love life looked promising, as he stepped through a delicate courting dance, trading stolen glances and significant looks with a girl from 3-B. Tanaka Miyako was smart, cute, funny, kind, all that good stuff, _and_ she was also headed to Keio. The reasons for Sho _not_ to say anything dwindled as the days progressed, as summer turned to fall and every morning he skated to school on a blanket of golden red sunshine. And when he thought about it, seriously thought about it, the only thing stopping him from making a move was Ohno. Well, not Ohno himself, exactly, but the nagging feeling that there was still something about their relationship that hadn't quite fit into place, idling in a circular state of limbo.

  
"I don't like her."

Sho barely withheld his retort that Ohno didn't like girls in general, but after he'd been scolded for one too many pandering, overenthusiastic remarks about this guy's butt or that guy's pecs ("Stop it, Sho-kun. Just because you're straight, it doesn't mean that you're attracted to every woman you see. Unless you're that desperate, which wouldn't surprise me."), he'd decided to make a conscious effort not to make Ohno's sexuality an arbitrary focal point in their conversations. So far, Ohno had seemed more at ease, so Sho marked it down as a success.

He caught Ohno's eyes watching him, watching his silence. The look on Ohno's face dared him to make a comment. "Why not?" Sho asked weakly.

Ohno shrugged casually. "Why should I?" Edging forward slowly, he toed at some leaves, soggy from the previous night's rain.

By the time they reached the intersection where they went their separate ways each morning, Sho had come up with about ten different answers, ranging from "she's pretty cool" to "you've never even met her" to "she reminds me a bit of your mom", but none of them -- especially the bit about his mom... God only knew what would become of him if he'd said that one, even though he meant it in the best of ways -- seemed to be adequate.

Sho waved. "You headed to the park again?" Ohno nodded. "Cool, I'll come pick you up after school."

  
Ohno had taken a year off after high school to finish his portfolio, soon to be shipped off to some prestigious art school that Ohno never said the name of. Sho asked him on multiple occasions what school it was, but Ohno only smirked a self-conscious kind of smirk and said, "I'll tell you if I get in." There was something wrong with the world if someone as talented as Ohno was worried about getting into his top-choice art school, but Ohno's eyes lit up whenever he talked about it, like sparklers at a festival, so Sho accepted that it must have been worth the anxiety.

  
At school that day, Sho passed Tanaka on his way to the cafeteria for lunch, but all he could manage was a smile and a slight nod before she blushed deeply and cast a highly conspicuous glance at her patent leather Mary Janes in response. Sho followed her gaze, his mouth quirked to the side. Ohno's dirty sneakers in the leaves that morning had been nicer to look at.

  
Sho found Ohno in an unpopulated corner of the park, sitting under a tree with his arms propped up on his knees, a sketchbook tucked under one and his head tipped onto the other. Sho smiled and sat down next to him, grass stains be damned, and looked out into the lawn in the middle. A couple of grade schoolers were chasing each other with twigs held like swords, wearing wrestling masks and growling high-pitched threats like "I'm gonna beat you up" and "your death rays are no match for my muscles of justice". Sho chuckled and stretched, shuffling closer to Ohno as a cool wind blew by.

He woke up to a long-fingered hand flicking him in the knee. He hadn't realized he'd fallen asleep, but then, he hadn't realized when he'd begun picking up strange habits from Ohno. He smacked the hand away and turned to the culprit, whose face shone with innocence. "Ready to go home?"

Ohno nodded and picked himself up, offering Sho a hand up. "Wanna see what I drew today?" He flipped his sketchbook open to a drawing of the two kids from before, playing together in a sandbox, back in a time when the world wasn't plagued with the threat of violence and death rays. The two were working together to build a giant cylinder of a sandcastle, patting the sides down and poking in holes for windows.

"You know what's sad about this?" Sho asked, running his fingers lightly over the lines.

"Mm?"

"The poor bastards are going to be stuck together for the rest of their lives."

Sho looked up, grinning, to watch Ohno's face as the pieces fell into place, and he got three feet away before Ohno caught up to him and jumped on his back. Sho jogged and carried him for 15 seconds, laughing as Ohno rubbed at his head and mumbled insults into his hair, before his arms screamed and he had to beg Ohno to get off.

  
When they got to the driveway of Ohno's house, Ohno stopped. "Hey, Sho-kun?"

Sho turned. "Yeah, what's up?"

"If I get into that school I want to go to, will you move into an apartment with me?" Hope, it sounded like hope.

Sho sighed, looking back at Ohno's house, at the ground around his feet, before he walked past Ohno and back into the street.

"Sho-kun?" This time, it sounded like heartbreak.

Sho stopped, eyeing the house at the far end of the road, lights within it dancing with movement and life. "Sorry, Satoshi-kun, I can't have dinner tonight." He turned to look back at Ohno. "I have to go find an apartment for two."

Ohno's smile looked like springtime in full bloom.

  
**five.**

It had never been a question of "if" or "if not", or "will" or "will not", but only of "when".

Sho got the text message in early February during a math class that, honestly, no one was paying attention to anymore. "Tokyo University of the Arts," it said. Sho responded with the address for their new apartment.

  
They moved in the day of Sho's graduation ceremony. The Ohnos were there, sitting with Sho's family, glistening with pride like Sho was one of their own. Ohno was waving little Shu's arms around as he sat in Ohno's lap, teaching him shadow puppets when the names dragged on too long. After the ceremony, Sho's father slapped Sho squarely on the back, and his mother and Mai, who was a year away from high school herself, beamed at him. Ohno and Shu ran up to him, yelling, "Sho-niichan, Sho-niichan!" in obstreperous harmony, and Sho laughed and patted them on their heads.

The most effective arrangement for moving, they found, was to let Ohno carry the heavier objects, because at least his whining came with some results. Sho was relegated to carrying the awkward, oblong objects or to yelling encouragement while the others -- Ohno, Mr. Ohno, Mrs. Ohno, Mina, Sho's father, Sho's mother, Mai, and even Shu -- did the heavy lifting. Of course, he also got a severe helping of name-calling and some literal butt-kicking (that was Ohno, who still managed to get his leg up that high even while he was carrying an oversized box taller and likely heavier than him), but sticks and stones, Sho thought to himself smugly, sticks and stones.

  
They had a couple of weeks before classes started for either of them, but both Sho and Ohno had decided that settling in was more important than going out. It was in that two weeks that they discovered it was a less-than-fine idea to try to live off Ohno's chahan for the rest of their lives and, in discovering so, gained 15 pounds between the two of them. It was also during that time that they realized it was an even worse idea to try to live off anything Sho cooked, because they would be dead before they could gain any weight. Battered and broken and intermittently dry heaving, they quickly located the closest conbini, just two intersections down, in the exact opposite direction that they'd been looking. They stocked up on everything they could get their hands on that was dry, instant, or non-perishable, and they grabbed some nikuman (the big ones) for the road.

Sho gulped down a nikuman in record time, feeding bites to Ohno whenever he opened his mouth and raised an eyebrow and pointedly jiggled the bags in his arms. Sho pulled out another one and peeled off the paper. Someone in the back of his mind was reminding him that walking and eating just _wasn't done_ \-- it sounded like his mother, or Mai when she wanted to blackmail him with something, and Sho was amazed that even at her age she was starting to sound just like their mother -- but he didn't live with them anymore, and he planned to take advantage of that fact to the fullest. He took a hearty bite of the nikuman, roaring into it. Beside him, Ohno laughed.

"You're hungry, huh, Sho-niichan?"

"Stop calling me that. And yes, I am hungry. Want another bite?"

Ohno opened his mouth wide in response.

  
Sho wasn't ready the first time Ohno brought a guy home to the apartment. He wasn't too sure how or why he was supposed to be ready, but it was certain that he was in no condition to concentrate on his macroeconomics reading when Ohno was bursting through the door, stumbling in, arms linked with some nondescript tall guy.

"Sho-kun I'm home!" Ohno cried wildly, face flushed and--

"Satoshi-kun, are you drunk? Where'd you get alcohol? You're not even 20 yet!" Sho pushed his book aside, scrambling up and heading toward the door.

"Oh but in Korea Sho-kun they start counting with one at the beginning of the year so really I'm 21 one one one..."

"We're not in fucking Korea, Satoshi-kun! Hi," Sho greeted, nodding tersely at the gangly stranger before returning his attention to Ohno. He unwound Ohno's pliant arm from the stranger's, and threw it over his shoulder. "Come on, take off your shoes." Sho turned to the stranger as Ohno nuzzled into his neck, _one one one one_. "Thanks for bringing him home. You can go now."

"But Satoshi wanted--"

"Don't call him that, you don't even know him! Out, get out!" Sho screamed, pushing the stranger with his free hand and kicking the door shut. "Satoshi-kun, come on, take off your shoes." Sho slowly lowered Ohno to the ground until he was on all fours.

"Shoes! Shoes shoes..." Ohno mumbled, flopping onto his butt and grabbing at the laces clumsily.

"That's right, off with your shoes. Concentrate." Sho steadied Ohno as he slumped sideways, gritting his teeth and tugging his shoelaces untied, prying his shoes off his feet, one, and then the other. "Good, good job. Okay, can you-- let me get you some water." Sho released Ohno's shoulders slowly, like a parent dreading the tip of the bicycle on his child's first ride, and found himself catching Ohno again. "All right, come on, stand up, let's go get some water from the kitchen." Sho wrenched Ohno upward and caught him as he fell into his arms.

"Mm Sho-kun hello."

"Hello, Satoshi-kun. How the hell did you make it back to the apartment like this?"

"Tequila shots, really good."

Oh, of course. Sho got Ohno when the alcohol was starting to hit him the worst. "You know what else is really good, Satoshi-kun?"

"Wuzzat?"

"Water!"

"WATER?!"

"That's right! Let's get you some water." Sho led Ohno across the living room and into the kitchen, juggling Ohno as he reached into the cupboard for a glass and filled it with tap water. "Here. Drink, drink." He nudged Ohno in the shoulder, who turned around, leaning back against Sho and taking the glass in both his hands. "Drink, it's good. No, drink more."

"Can't Sho-kun my stomach's full..."

"Okay, all right. Do you want to lie down?" A noncommittal hum. "Okay, let's go lie down in bed. Take the water with you." They started their way to Ohno's bedroom.

Step, step.

"Nng?"

"What is it?" _Keep stepping._

"Where's Yanagizawa-kun?"

Step, step.

"Yanagizawa-kun had to go. It's okay, Satoshi-kun, I'm here. Come on, keep going."

Step, step, step.

"Oh that's okay then I like you better anyway Sho-kun."

Stop.

Sho breathed. "Come on, time to lie down. We're almost there."

Step, step, step.

"Will you lie down with me Sho-kun?"

Stop.

"Just until you fall asleep, okay? All right, here we are, time to lie down now." Sho sat Ohno down on the edge of his bed and took the glass of water from Ohno, placing it on the nightstand. He looked back at Ohno, who was watching him with expectant eyes. "Let me-- I'll get some pajamas and be right back, okay? I'll be right back, I promise. Now lie down."

Ohno nodded and flopped to the side, pulling his legs up onto the bed. Sho could feel Ohno's eyes on his back as he grabbed a set of pajamas from Ohno's armoire and, looking back to see Ohno propped up on an arm, still watching him intently in a way that only someone completely plastered could, grabbed a second set of pajamas for himself. He tossed the first at Ohno without looking. "I'm not dressing you, okay? So put those on yourself." He stood facing the armoire with his hands on his hips, waiting until he heard the unzip of jeans, before he changed into his own set of pajamas.

Sho turned around to see Ohno sitting up completely, fumbling with the buttons of his polo shirt. Sho sighed, climbing onto the bed to straddle Ohno's legs and undo the buttons. He was well aware of Ohno's eyes working across his cheeks, eyes, nose, lips, stopping there. "Banzai." Ohno lifted his arms silently, his eyes unwavering as Sho peeled the shirt off and weaved Ohno's arms into the pajama top. He breathed slowly as he did up the buttons, looking up into Ohno's eyes when he was done. They were several shades darker than normal.

"Sho-kun," Ohno breathed, his eyes flitting between Sho's eyes and his lips.

Sho focused on a spot behind Ohno's head, putting a hand on Ohno's chest and pushing. "Time for sleep, Satoshi-kun." Ohno's arms grabbed him and pulled him down with him.

Sho breathed into Ohno's hair. "You won't be able to fall asleep this way," he whispered, rolling himself off Ohno and staring at the ceiling.

"Sho-kun..." Ohno rolled onto Sho's side, and Sho could feel Ohno's erection, half hard against his thigh. Ohno's hand slid under the collar of Sho's shirt, his mouth and tongue sucking hotly and making wet, spit-slick noises against Sho's neck. Ohno moved closer, pressing harder into Sho's leg, grinding in tiny circles. He groaned softly into Sho's skin. His hand started to run down Sho's shirt, unbuttoning with a dexterity that he didn't seem to have just a minute ago. "Sho-kun, I think I love y--"

"Sleep." It had come out louder than he'd meant it to. Ohno's body went rigid, and he finally rolled away.

  
It didn't take long for Ohno to fall asleep. Sho lifted himself out of bed and went into the bathroom to find some painkillers for Ohno's inevitable hangover. He left them by the glass on the nightstand, along with a note -- "Drink." -- and shut the bedroom door on his way out. He paused to survey the abandoned stack of economics readings in the living room, not forgotten but also not finished, before he turned off the light and headed into his own room.

He was on his bed for all of thirteen seconds before he jammed his hand down his pants, working his cock furiously. "Fuck. Fuck. Fuckfuckfuckfuck. _Fuck._ " He twisted his wrist, smearing precum along the underside of the head, squeezing and flicking and arching up off the bed, pulling his cock desperately, imagining Ohno's eyes and his hands and his mouth and his tongue and his cock until--

Sho came, gasping, shuddering, tugging at his cock through the orgasm.

He grabbed a tissue from the box on his nightstand, dragging it through the cum on his stomach and on Ohno's pajamas. He wadded it up and threw it at the wall, too tired to think or care about anything anymore.

He laid flat on his back, hands at his sides, letting his breathing regularize. His eyes tracked across the ceiling.

"Shit."

Sleep didn't come for a long time.

  
**six.**

If there was one thing Sho knew about alcohol, it was that details blurred together, that events happened at the speed of light. One minute it was the opening credits, and the next the denouement. You knew you were awake the entire time, but you couldn't seem to connect the dots, and you were left wondering where the climax went. Things that were always a good idea in your head suddenly became a good idea out loud, and you just couldn't help yourself, even if you knew that the next morning you wouldn't realize that you'd helped yourself in the first place. And that was just when you were tipsy.

Sho's soccer senpai had never let him get drunk-off-his-ass drunk, so he honestly didn't know what that felt like. He assumed that it meant faster time travel, bigger blotches in your memory, a magnified likelihood of acting on impulse. He could only hope that for Ohno it would make him unable to remember all of the things Sho wanted to forget.

  
Sho was sitting on the couch, finishing his reading assignments when he heard a pained groan from Ohno's room. He dropped his book and rushed to Ohno's door, walking in without knocking. "Satoshi-kun, how are you feeling?"

Ohno was sitting up in bed, his arms wound loosely around his stomach. He looked up at Sho grimly.

  
Sho assumed that throwing up the next morning was rare, because for most people the alcohol should have been absorbed by then. As he rubbed Ohno's back gently with his hand, he thought idly that throwing up was almost like crying. "Shh, it's okay, just let it all out. You'll feel better," he whispered, soothing cadences as they kneeled together in front of the toilet, Ohno's right hand grasped tightly in Sho's.

Sho was quick to usher Ohno back into his room afterwards, pointing sternly at the nightstand and then at the bed. Ohno nodded, drinking the painkillers and half the remaining water. Sho waited until Ohno was settled in his bed before he turned to leave, but he found his hand caught in Ohno's. He turned back questioningly.

"Don't leave," Ohno mumbled, looking at the floor by Sho's feet. Pursing his lips, Sho stepped up to the bed and cupped his hand against Ohno's cheek, turning his head to look into his eyes. This wasn't drunk Ohno, horny Ohno who just wanted to feel good. This was Ohno, sick and miserable, who for longer than was necessary had slept next to his mother on the days when he just wasn't ready to face the world.

Sho nodded, and Ohno smiled softly. "Let me get some books first, and I'll be right back."

When Sho returned with his books and climbed into bed, Ohno curled into him automatically. He could feel Ohno's lips pressed innocently against his shoulder. "Thank you, Sho-kun." Sho wiggled a hand out to pet Ohno's hair softly, flipping through the book propped against his chest with the other. He concentrated on his reading, holding onto the words on the page like they were his last lifeline.

  
They had the talk after Ohno woke up, sitting together on the bed. Not _the_ talk, exactly, but _a_ talk. About alcohol. Sho learned that Ohno had had some drinking experience from when his high school art club had their occasional art-free get-togethers, but he certainly didn't have enough experience with hard liquor and with knowing his limits. Sho scolded him and warned him not to bring strange men home and told him to please call if he needed a ride home and asked him above all to not put Sho in that position again. Ohno pouted apologetically and nodded, but Sho knew that Ohno didn't understand what Sho really meant by "that position".

They had another talk after that, during which Sho introduced the idea of taking a trip during summer vacation. His first semester was going to end in July, as was Ohno's, and maybe it would be a nice break to get out of the apartment and away for a while. Ohno's eyes glittered at the thought. Sho's fist tightened and relaxed. His reasons for wanting a change of atmosphere were different from Ohno's.

  
Korea!, they decided. Sho joked that Ohno seemed to know little tidbits about Korea, and when Ohno raised an eyebrow and asked what Sho was talking about, Sho decided not to push his luck with any other things Ohno had forgotten about that night. Sho volunteered to borrow some phrasebooks from the library because no, he explained between wheezing laughs, it wouldn't be possible to get by with just the words "kimchi" and "bibimbap" for two weeks. Ohno grinned cheekily and volunteered, then, to put together the itinerary, and Sho knew at that moment that he'd lost.

They booked a flight together, Ohno whining that he wanted an evening flight but Sho completely disregarding him. Sho regretted it later, as he dragged two suitcases and Ohno into the corridor the morning of their flight, tripping over a suitcase left in front of the neighbors' door.

Sho muttered bitterly. "Come on, Satoshi-kun, stop messing around and help out. The train ride to Narita is an hour long, so you can take a nap then." He stopped, and Ohno leaned like dead weight into his side. "Didn't you tell me you were good at getting up in the morning?"

Ohno blinked slowly and backed away, yawning and taking his suitcase from Sho's grasp. "I am, but this is _vacation_ , Sho-kun. I don't understand why we have to leave so early." He kicked his legs out petulantly as they continued walking.

"Cost-benefit analysis. The marginal cost of losing a day in Korea exceeds the marginal benefit of sleeping in a few extra hours."

Ohno made a buzzer noise. "What bullshit do they teach you in those econ classes, Sho-kun?" Sho looked at the lopsided grin on Ohno's face and laughed.

  
The next year, they decided to go to Guam. Ohno had been wanting to go, and Sho himself found that about a year in the same apartment with Ohno was as much as he could handle. Sometime after Korea, Ohno had started watching him, watching as he moved around the apartment or read on the couch or left for lunch appointments with friends. Sho was surprised that he noticed, really, but he was probably just going stir-crazy, focusing on the little things that made it infinitely worse. He needed to get out.

  
Something about the mix of fluorescent and natural light in the beach resort gift shop made Sho's heart stand still. Ohno was standing in a sunbeam, his hair glowing, framing the small smile on his face as he examined some necklaces on a pivoting rack. Sho cleared his throat and walked to stand beside him, thumbing through the necklaces.

"Getting something for your mom?" Sho asked casually, turning a little dog charm over between his fingers. Ohno hummed the affirmative. "I think I'm going to get something for Tanaka. Wanna help me pick something out?"

Ohno turned to look at Sho, eyebrows furrowed. Sho ignored the look, turning the rack to a new section. "You mean Tanaka from high school? Do you even see her anymore? And no, I don't want to help you pick something out."

Sho laughed tightly, continuing to pick through necklaces. "You're a jerk, Satoshi-kun."

Ohno's glance stayed on Sho's face for a little longer before it returned to the necklaces. "Do you even like her?" Ohno asked quietly.

"Yeah, I do." _No, I don't._

Ohno fell silent.

  
The necklace, silver, adorned with a cat wearing a gemstone bow, ended up going to Mai.

  
**seven.**

Sho was reluctant to agree when Ohno said he didn't want to go on vacation that next year. But then he said that his family wasn't wealthy like Sho's, and that the economy was bad, and that he got tired of walking around all the time.

"The economy's been bad for more than a decade, Satoshi-kun. The bubble burst in 1989."

Ohno threw his hands up in apparent outrage. "It's even worse than I thought!"

Sho laughed, conceding. "Okay, okay, no vacation this year." His insides churned at the thought.

  
Ohno's eyebrows creased in thought as they headed down the corridor to buy some food at the conbini.

"What's wrong, Satoshi-kun?"

Ohno's mouth twitched, as it did sometimes. Sho smiled. "That suitcase in the corridor. Wasn't it there last year, too?"

Sho thought back to the previous year. He couldn't remember anything like it, really, but he'd probably been too preoccupied with the way Ohno had been looking at him to notice much of anything else. "I didn't notice it. What's it look like?"

Ohno glided down the stairs and turned to face Sho. "It's a little rolly suitcase. Brown."

Sho skipped the last step, and they turned right to head toward the conbini. "I don't..." Wait. "Actually, I think it was there two years ago, too. I tripped over it when I was carrying you to Korea."

Ohno laughed. "Wow, really? It's like the phantom suitcase. I wonder why it's always there."

"Maybe the guy always goes on vacation the same time we do."

Ohno hummed, unconvinced. "But why wouldn't he leave it inside his apartment?"

Sho snapped his fingers. "I've got it. There are drugs in it, and he's waiting for someone to steal it so that he can get the person in trouble."

"Or maybe he's lonely and he wants to share his drugs with others."

Sho smacked Ohno in the head. "Don't be an idiot." Ohno's twinkling laugh echoed down the street.

  
Sho stared at a spot on the wall and picked at the fabric against his chest, trying to get air to circulate through his tank top. "I hope you're happy, Satoshi-kun," he called. "You're going to have a hard time burying me when I've melted into the couch."

"I'll just have to buy a really big casket," Ohno responded, walking out of the bathroom, a towel wrapped around his waist. "Or I could make one. I've been playing with wood a lot lately."

"I'm sure you have," Sho countered, his eyes returning to the wall. He heard the distinct rustle of cloth.

"Don't be gross, Sho-kun." A towel snapped against Sho's arm.

"Shit, that hurt!" Ohno laughed while Sho massaged his arm. He turned his head to yell obscene things about Ohno's mother, catching a glimpse of Ohno's naked butt as it retreated into the bedroom.

  
They sat side by side, staring at the wall, breathing in and out. Sho drummed his fingers against his stomach.

"Satoshi-kun, I'm bored."

"What are you, four? Go read something."

"Read all the newspapers."

"Summer homework?"

"Did it all."

"Surf the web?"

"Computer's too far away."

Ohno laughed. "Not my problem, Sho-kun."

"Aaaaaaahhhhh!" Sho spun rapidly and swung his fist at Ohno, who caught his wrist, giggling, before swinging his own fist in return. Wrestling with Ohno, Sho realized belatedly as he fell to the floor on his back, was probably one of the most unwise things he could have done. Because, Sho thought, his wrists pinned by his head, their smiles evaporating as Ohno looked down at him, dark and unreadable against the backlighting from the ceiling... Because it was different now.

They weren't in high school anymore.

"Sho-kun," Ohno breathed, barely a whisper. Sho's heart was racing, blood pounding through his veins like wild horses. He felt Ohno's hands slip off his wrists as he drew back slowly, swallowing visibly, never breaking eye contact. He sat on his heels, kneeling over Sho's legs. Biting his lip and smiling sheepishly, gaze averted, Ohno opened his mouth to speak, but Sho reached up and rushed forward, grabbing the back of Ohno's neck and sealing their lips together.

Sho had never kissed anyone like this before. It wasn't like the boring girls he dated in high school, or the random hookups in the park. It was Ohno, Ohno's plush lips against his, Ohno's hand a warm weight between his neck and his shoulder. Sho rearranged his legs and pushed forward, pressing Ohno into the base of the couch, and Ohno moaned, his mouth opening, his tongue slipping forward to lick between Sho's lips, and Sho was gone, completely gone.

Eventually Sho pulled back and broke the kiss, breathing hard, watching Ohno's eyelids flutter open, Ohno's eyes dark, darker than he'd ever seen them. "Sho-kun," he whispered, his voice like gravel, running his hand through Sho's hair. Sho squeezed the hand on Ohno's hip and closed his eyes, leaning forward--

A wordless bellow sounded through the walls, followed by an earth-shattering crash. Their heads snapped to the side in alarm.

"What was that?" Sho whispered urgently.

"I dunno."

Sho strained his ears, listening for more noises. "That was from the apartment next door, wasn't it?"

Ohno crawled out of his grasp, standing up. Sho stood up as well, walking forward. "We should go see if everyone's okay. Maybe they're in trouble." He heard footsteps behind him as Ohno caught up.

Suddenly, there was a loud bang on their door. Sho yelped, and Ohno placed a hand on the small of his back, smirking at him, before he slipped forward and opened the door.

On the other side was a stick of a man holding up a six-pack of Kirin. "My TV broke. Can I come in?"

  
He was on vacation, he explained, a first-year university student camping out in his aunt's and uncle's apartment while they were gone for a couple of weeks. He'd been forced to room with a guy throughout high school ("and even to this day, that bastard") who liked to cook "really suspicious dishes", but the stranger didn't even like to eat normal food that much, so he used every opportunity he could find to sneak away.

Sho eyed the stranger's stubby fingers and his messy bangs. "How old are you?"

"I turned 19 last month."

"Happy birthday," Ohno mumbled quietly, and the stranger gave him a soft little smile, mumbling a "thank you" in return.

"Where'd you get the beer?" Sho queried.

The stranger pointed his thumb in the direction of his apartment. "My uncle had his coming-of-age ceremony about 30 years ago, I'd say."

Sho laughed emptily, unamused. He'd had enough trouble with minors drinking alcohol, and it wasn't really fun and games to him anymore.

The stranger leaned back on his arms, his elbows overextending, squinting his eyes at Sho. "Look, I'm sorry if I interrupted your Bert and Ernie time--"

"I'm not gay," Sho snapped suddenly, unexpectedly. The words came out of his mouth before he even knew he wanted to say them.

The stranger paused, looking at Ohno when Sho didn't dare to, before continuing his thought. "Whatever. I just wanted to see if you guys were around for once and if you wanted to play video games or something. Since my TV's broken and all."

"Oh, wait," Ohno said, and Sho could hear a smile and a slight waver in his voice, "you're the suitcase guy!"

The stranger chuckled, leaning forward to smile again at Ohno. "Am I? If you say so. But you can just call me Nino if you want."

  
**eight.**

It was like watching a love story unfold before his very eyes.

Ninomiya Kazunari, or "Nino", had a way of talking to people that made it feel as if they'd known him for years. It wasn't that he was really friendly, or particularly outgoing, even, but it was something deeper in the way he interacted with the people around him. It was just the right amount of attentiveness and interest, mixed with just the right amount of teasing, that made it comfortable to be around him, no matter what you were talking about.

Even Sho, who was the first to admit to his guarded nature when it came to meeting new people, took a real, personal liking to Nino before he'd even touched his second can of Kirin. He had a number of professional acquaintances and social connections, to be sure, earned from skills he developed growing up the son of a politician, but so few of them actually made it to that level of unabashed, uncensored friendship. An hour after an undesirable first impression, he was already trading verbal blows with the other man like they weren't still at "hello" and "how do you do" and "what kind of moral character do you have".

What was even more remarkable was watching Nino interact with Ohno. See, Sho understood Ohno. Ohno was hyper, excitable, kind, and incredibly funny... about a year after you got to know him. But until you got him to open up, he was just a regular guy who liked to complain and space out -- though, of course, that didn't stop just because you got to know him. Nino, though... Nino asked the kinds of questions Ohno wanted to answer, laughed at the comments that Ohno didn't think were interesting, affirmed Ohno's beliefs, complemented Ohno's very existence. And it wasn't just empty words, lip-service to a god who didn't realize he was one. Nino had somehow made it possible for Ohno to give as good as he got, to be exactly who he wanted to be with a man he had just met. Energy flowed freely between the two as they opened up to each other like positive and negative space.

Sho was a little jealous, to be honest. No doubt Nino was a smart guy, what with the way he could hand you your ass on a plate before you'd even set the table, but Sho was smart, too. Top marks, honors student, diligent worker, highly recommended for this position in your company if you would be so gracious as to take him. But when Nino did in seven minutes what Sho had taken one year to do, he couldn't help but feel like he'd failed a test that everyone had been expecting him to pass.

Sho watched the two of them huddle closer and closer together, watched Ohno giggle at something Nino whispered in his ear, watched Nino watch Ohno talk about his family. Sho swirled the remainder of the beer in his can, looking at the majestic Kirin blankly, before downing it in one go.

  
"We're having Nino over for lunch today," Ohno said as soon as he finished brushing his teeth the next morning.

Sho peeked over the top of the newspaper, eyeing the kitchen. It looked like a dried up canyon. "Great. Does he taste good?"

Ohno chuckled, the couch seat dipping with his weight. Sho looked at him briefly before handing him the international news section. They read peacefully for a bit, the companionable quiet accompanied by the dull murmur of Ohno sounding out katakana under his breath ( _Shouldn't have given him the international section,_ Sho thought wryly, turning the page), which dwindled once or twice, usually Sho's cue to read a kanji compound for him.

"You really can't read 'equilibrium', Satoshi-kun?"

"The next time the word comes up in your art class, let me know."

Sho laughed and promised to do just that, feeling Ohno's gaze on him. He turned the page and forgot which article he was reading.

  
Nino came exactly at noon. It wasn't difficult for him to be on time, seeing as he had to walk all of 10 feet to get to their apartment. But with him came pasta, which made his appearance that much more impressive.

"Ah, Nino, our savior! What would we do without you?" Sho sang.

"Now, now, Sho-san, save all of your applause till the end." He smiled exaggeratedly at Ohno, who laughed and ushered him into the living room.

  
Post-meal entertainment came in the form of song and dance. Well, mostly song, after a one-two step that for some unknown reason had Sho howling, leaning into Ohno's side. Nino came back to their apartment, battered black guitar case in hand, asking them questions to get a feel for the musical potential in the apartment, strumming random chords as they talked. Nino, it seemed, was the only one who played the guitar, but he and Nino both played the piano, and all three of them sang in the shower.

"Oh, my mom really likes western music," Ohno volunteered.

"Ah, she does, doesn't she? She made us listen to something or other when we were there during New Year's."

Ohno nodded and caught Sho's eye for an instant, looking away just as quickly. Sho grimaced at the floor before transferring his gaze to Nino, who was considering him with penetrating eyes. Sho uncrossed and recrossed his legs.

"Sho-san," Nino articulated slowly, eyes narrowing, "there's something you're not telling me." His eyes passed from Sho back to Ohno, back to Sho again. Sho squirmed nervously. "What was that, Sho-san, you like to rap? Why didn't you tell me sooner?" Ohno laughed, delighted, and Nino smirked proudly.

"What? I--"

"Well, what are you waiting for? Let's hear it!" Nino nodded, smiling superficially.

"I..." Sho started, blinking in confusion. Ohno was looking at him with an expectant grin on his face. Nino continued to smile at him. And like a bullet train, it hit him. This really had nothing to do with rap. Nino had read the atmosphere in the room and twisted it in on itself. He was helping Sho fix it without even knowing what was broken in the first place.

Nino really was his savior.

Sho smiled gratefully at Nino, who smiled just a little wider, before he cleared his throat. And then he threw himself head-first into a rousing rendition of a newspaper article he'd read that morning about the expansion of Japanese automobile part makers in China, stuttering and repeating words, waving his arms around, littering it with "uh" and "yeah" and "yo" and "baby" where it felt appropriate. Ohno had curled in on himself in silent laughter, and Nino was rubbing his chin, eyes narrowed in feigned appraisal.

"Good, great," Nino deadpanned when the dust had settled. "Let's never speak of this again."

  
**nine.**

By the end of Nino Week One, as Ohno called it, a tiny smile tugging at the edges of his lips, they had gotten accustomed to having Nino around the apartment. He was almost like the third wheel, except that he was the giant wheel on a tricycle, the one that steered the ship and made sure everything else was in good, working order. Sho also realized that Nino had him tripping over himself and mixing metaphors like he'd never done before, and while part of him was grateful to have something new occupying his mind, another part of him wondered what it meant that sometimes his mouth went dry when Nino sang a song that he'd composed or when Nino wasn't even doing anything more than just looking at him. And Nino spent a _lot_ of time looking at him.

Though to Nino's unending credit, his presence, whatever else it caused Sho to feel, almost completely took the tension out of Sho's and Ohno's relationship. Almost.

  
It was like there wasn't enough space to go around, Sho thought in wonder, looking at Ohno and Nino pressed together on the couch. Nino was listening to music, headphones woven delicately up from his pocket and around his fingers. He tapped along quietly, drumming against Ohno's leg with his index fingers, and smiled when Ohno pulled an earbud out of Nino's ear and fit it in his own. Nino muttered something with a sly look on his face, and Ohno jiggled with laughter.

But inevitably... oh, there it was. Nino was looking at Sho again, cracking his knuckles for lack of anything else to do. Sho didn't miss the way Ohno's eyes twitched to the side and back when Nino put a hand high on his thigh, but Ohno couldn't possibly have seen that Nino hadn't been looking at him at all.

  
Sho didn't know what to make of Nino, really, or of himself, caught up in skipping stupidly with Nino as they jumped around lamp posts on their way to the conbini. Nino was somewhere between 5 and 50 in mental age, but Sho couldn't pin it down, and he certainly couldn't predict when the 5 year old would suddenly grow up long enough to look at him as an adult before reverting back to his giggly immaturity.

But really, maybe Sho was making it all up, he thought for the first time that hour, for as soon as they got to the conbini, Nino doubled back to walk in with Ohno, saying something to the other man, and Ohno had an expression on his face that said he understood Nino completely.

"Dinner's on me tonight, guys. Pick out whatever you want," Sho said, brandishing his wallet. Ohno mumbled an "oh, really?" and flitted away.

Nino nodded at the wallet with critical eyes. "How old is that thing?"

"I got it as a present for graduating middle school."

"So it's about 30 years old, then?"

Sho smacked Nino on the arm with the wallet, making him giggle and slouch further into himself.

  
"He really likes you, you know," Sho said as they rounded the corner into the office supplies aisle, bursting with pens and pencils and retractable erasers.

Nino hummed like he didn't know, picking up a business card holder and turning it over in his hand. "But don't you like him?"

"I told you, I'm not gay."

Nino gave him a look that said "don't be a dumbass" before returning his attention to the small metal envelope. He put it back, and they kept walking.

"What about me?" Nino asked, slipping his hands into his pockets.

"What _about_ you?"

Nino stepped in close, too close, and Sho could smell hints of Ohno's shampoo in his hair. "Do you like me?"

Sho stood there, motionless, for what felt like two lifetimes (his and Nino's), before Nino grinned, pecked him on the cheek, and hopped away.

  
Sho found them later by the premade onigiri, Nino's arm draped lazily over Ohno's shoulder. Nino turned his head toward Ohno, catching Sho's eye, and dropped a languid kiss to Ohno's jaw without breaking eye contact. Ohno smacked Nino lightly on the head, blushing behind his grin.

  
Sho found them even later, after he'd finished washing the dishes from their carbonara and hamburger dinner, making out on Ohno's bed, impossibly sweet and soft, bodies woven together as hands traced and touched all over. Sho's blinked a few times and backed out, quietly closing the door. Somehow it didn't add up, Sho thought as he headed into his own bedroom. He'd always imagined Nino to be a more aggressive kisser.

  
Nino didn't understand the meaning of the word "subtlety", it seemed, as he walked out of Ohno's bedroom and into the living room the next morning. "Good morning, Sho-san," he yawned, scratching his face and heading into the bathroom.

"Good morning, Nino," Sho replied behind his newspaper. He waited for a response, his eyes stalling on the words "International Labor Organization". When he received none, he continued reading.

"I didn't sleep with him, you know." Loud, right next to him.

Sho folded the paper up and dropped it into his lap. He turned to Nino, sitting on the opposite end of the couch with his back to the armrest. "It's really none of my business if you do."

"Oh, but it is, because he really likes you, and you really like him, but he really likes me, too, and he's torn because of that."

Sho wondered when his life had turned into a soap opera, and why he'd ever let it happen. "Do you even like him?"

Nino huffed scornfully. "What, do you think I'm using him or something? I'm not an asshole like you, Sho-san."

"You didn't answer my question."

Nino crossed his arms over his chest like a sulking cat. "I do like him. A lot. And I really wish you'd stop hurting him like this."

Sho turned away, letting his eyes roam aimlessly around the room.

"Well, I guess you can't really help it, though, right? People with shitty haircuts like yours don't have feelings."

Sho laughed, throwing the newspaper at Nino. It stopped in midair and drifted down like a maple leaf between them.

  
It was like being doused with a bucket of cold water when Sho pushed open Ohno's bedroom door that night to find Ohno and Nino in a much less innocent -- and much less clothed -- position than the one they'd been in the night before. Nino had his cheek pressed into the pillow, hair plastered to his face, his ass in the air as Ohno swirled his tongue in and back out again. Nino was panting and moaning a mewling kind of moan, pitch escalating, like a song only meant for Ohno to hear, and Ohno's sweaty fingers rearranged their grip as they pried Nino's ass further open to lick and kiss as deep as he could. Nino braced himself on one arm, reaching down with the other to brush his fingers over his cock, and groaned low in his throat, his eyes opening the tiniest bit.

_Shit._

Sho recognized the instant Nino's mind registered Sho's presence. Nino's eyes flared and darkened, his grip on his cock tightening.

Sho backed out, not bothering to close the door, and walked into his bedroom, leaning his head back against the door as it closed behind him.

  
**ten.**

Sho was absolutely certain that the way Ohno's bedroom door had been left ajar that night was Nino's doing. Intentionally or not, and whatever the hell for, no one could say. Sho didn't know why Nino cared so much or why he even believed it was any of his business to begin with, and who did he think he was anyway, showing up here so suddenly and acting like he was doing them all such a huge favor by solving the world's problems for them? Thanks, but no thanks, Ninomiya. Give the divine gift of your condescending bullshit philanthropy to someone who actually wants it.

Besides, Sho thought, slamming down the top of the rice cooker ferociously, he didn't even know what the main issue was. Was it about Ohno? Was it about Nino? Was it about Sho himself? Sho fumed and punched the start button, glaring at the rice cooker as it chimed its startup song. "I don't fucking know, okay?" he yelled at the rice cooker. The rice cooker gave him no response.

  
Ohno and Nino walked out of the bedroom together that morning, fingers loosely intertwined. Nino nodded in the direction of the bathroom, and Ohno let him go, smacking his butt lightly. Nino muttered, "Stop that," and Ohno grinned mischievously. His grin fell as soon as he noticed Sho on the couch, watching.

"Good morning, Sho-kun," Ohno said in an attempt at casual conversation, slumping into the couch.

Sho grunted, crossing his arms over his chest. He could feel the confusion pulsing from Ohno, but he ignored it.

The rice cooker chimed in the kitchen, cutting through the silence.

"Oh, you made rice?"

Sho stood and walked into the kitchen, grabbing a bowl and some furikake. He heard Ohno click his tongue discontentedly.

"Look, Sho-kun, I don't know why you're so pissy this morning, but I didn't do anything wrong, so don't take it out on me."

Sho looked up and met Ohno's eyes, upset and concerned. He sighed and looked back down at his rice bowl.

"You're right. I'm sorry. I don't know what it is. I think I--"

"--just had a bad night, right?" Nino said, stepping out of the bathroom. Sho turned to see the smirk on Nino's smug little face, and his mind completely shut down. He dropped his rice bowl on the counter and rushed at Nino, shoving him into the wall.

"Sho-kun!"

Sho returned to himself to see Ohno rushing over to Nino, who was wincing and holding his shoulder. The look in Ohno's eyes when he turned them on Sho was venomous.

Sho's eyes worked wildly, back and forth between Nino and Ohno. And then he turned away, grabbed his keys, squashed his shoes on, and walked out of the apartment.

  
Sho ended up in the park, of all places. He would have thought that autopilot would have taken him to Keio, or to his high school, or even to Ohno's house. But he'd lost himself days ago; months, years ago. He didn't even know what plane he was flying anymore.

Small children ran around him, laughing and yelling as mothers and older siblings yelled at them to be careful. The sun was high in the cloudless sky, the grass was plush and green and spreading out in every direction, and birds chirped merrily as they flew by, zooming in low and zipping back up to the tops of the trees. Sho looked up into the sky and squinted, shading his eyes with a hand. He smiled despite himself, asking his singing rice cooker and the voiceless deities what he'd done to deserve such a picturesque day.

Hands in his pockets, he walked to the sandbox, where he found a little boy and a little girl throwing sand at each other and laughing. He sat at the edge and took off his shoes, wiggling his toes in the sand.

"Hey, mister!" The little girl ran up to him, tapping his knee with a red shovel. "Will you help us build a castle?"

Sho smiled softly. "Sure."

They struggled for a bit to come up with realistic designs that didn't just flow away into tiny mountains of sand, but after several failed fledgling ventures, it didn't seem that they were having much luck. Looking at the kids and seeing the heartbreaking expressions on their tiny faces, Sho decided to pull out the big guns, teaching them all the tricks he knew.

"Get the wetter sand, the stuff that's closer to the bottom of the sandbox, and pack it in tight," he said, rolling his sleeves up to demonstrate. "That way, the sand will stick together better."

"When you make windows, don't just jab at the walls. Be gentle; we're building someone's home here."

"Make sure the castle is guarded on all four sides. You never know when the enemy will try to attack."

And they spent the next two hours building an enormous sandcastle, with turrets, and four outer walls with windows, and a moat with a drawbridge (though admittedly there wasn't any water under the bridge, since Sho learned from experience that physics wasn't that kind), and a small mound inside, as demanded by the chief architect, the little girl.

"What's this for?" Sho asked of the mound, packing it in, careful not to disturb the soldiers walking along the outer walls.

"That's where the king and queen live," the little boy explained.

"The king and queen? Is that you two?"

The kids grabbed each other's hands and nodded, eyes blazing.

Sho brushed the sand off his hands, sitting back on his haunches. "Wow, you guys are married already?"

The little girl nodded, holding up her hand to show a blade of grass tied around her ring finger.

"You're pretty young to be married, aren't you? Are you sure he's the right one? What if he's secretly the king of the enemy castle?"

The little boy yelled, "I wouldn't do that!" while the little girl yelled, "It doesn't make a difference!" The little boy jerked at the suggestion that he could possibly be the king of the enemy castle, but the little girl just grabbed his hand again and squeezed tighter, explaining. "If I love him, I love him. It shouldn't matter who he is."

Sho looked at her for a long time without saying anything.

And then, a voice from far away. "Naota! Misaki-chan! Time to go home!"

"Oops, gotta go. Bye-bye, mister!" Naota shouted, turning toward the voice.

"Bye-bye!" Misaki called, waving. They ran off together, hands held tight between them.

"Bye-bye!" Sho yelled. He waved to their retreating backs. "Thanks for playing with me."

  
Sho built four more sandcastles throughout the course of the afternoon and evening, each in a separate corner of the sandbox. One for him and Ohno, one for him and Nino, one for Ohno and Nino, and one for the three of them. The last one was by far the best.

  
His rice was cold by the time he got home late that night. He ate it quickly and placed the bowl in the sink, filling it with water. He'd wash it in the morning. He had more important things to do.

He walked to Ohno's bedroom, door ajar. He started to push it open but stopped when he heard a low groan and a gasp of "Ohno-san, harder", leaving very little to the imagination. He turned and walked into his own bedroom.

It felt so much better now, he thought, bucking into his hand, now that he wasn't filled with guilt and disgust and shame. It felt right, and real, like he'd finally come home without even noticing that he'd left. He thought of Ohno and Nino, of Ohno's elegant hands gripping at the back of Nino's knees as Ohno rolled like waves in and out of Nino's body. He thought of Ohno's mouth slipping hotly around Sho's own cock, of Nino's fingers clawing at the sheets beside Sho's head, bending forward, riding hard and fast. He thought of the three of them, of being together with Ohno _and_ Nino, of an intoxicating mix of mouths and lips and cocks and hands and hearts.

He came with a grunt, and the image of Ohno's and Nino's smiling faces faded out of his mind with the last of his orgasm as he fell into sleep.

  
**eleven.**

Apologizing was easier than Sho had imagined it would be. Sho drummed his hands against his legs, his mind sorting through a long list of phrases he could use to ask for forgiveness, but he drew a blank as soon as he saw Nino step out of Ohno's bedroom. Sho stood quickly, watching Nino's eyes narrow warily, and walked over. He stood awkwardly for a second before taking Nino's face in his hands and kissing him, not letting go until he felt Nino kiss back. And then he stepped back, his hands still on Nino's cheeks.

Nino frowned slightly. "I'll forgive you if you stop being an asshole."

Sho smiled weakly. "I can't make any promises, but I'll do my best."

Sho felt it against his palms before he saw it -- a real, genuine smile.

  
Sho could see the surprise on Ohno's face when he came out of his bedroom to see Nino and Sho curled up on the couch.

"It's okay, Ohno-san," Nino said into Sho's shoulder, "he's finally come back from the dark side."

It was natural, Sho realized, that Ohno wouldn't be so quick to forgive when his offenses against Ohno had been so much worse and drawn out for so much longer. He watched as Ohno treaded quietly toward them, stopping to stand in front of Sho.

Sho looked up at Ohno. "Satoshi-kun..." He rose to his feet, stepping forward once, twice, until their toes were touching and their faces weren't a foot away. He took Ohno's hand in his and brought it to his face, kissing the back of it, the heel, the palm, Ohno's face softening with each touch. Sho lowered Ohno's hand and leaned forward, brushing their lips together softly, again, and again, and again, until Ohno's unmoving lips started to respond, his head tilting slightly for a better angle. Sho glided his hands up Ohno's stomach, resting one hand on Ohno's neck and bringing the other to the back of Ohno's head. He felt Ohno's hands on his arm, his face. They stayed like that for a long moment before Sho broke the kiss, dragging his lips across Ohno's cheek and wrapping his arms around Ohno's shoulders. Ohno hugged him back, and it was the warmest Sho had felt in a long time.

Nino coughed from where he sat on the couch. "You guys are gross."

Sho laughed, squeezing Ohno with everything he had. "You're one to talk." He pulled back, sighing happily. He felt lovesick.

"So, now what?" Nino grumbled from behind him.

Ohno smiled, open-mouthed. "Threesome?" Sho and Nino burst out laughing, sharing an amused look as Ohno led them to the bedroom.

  
The rest of the day came in flashes.

Nino, licking at the head of Sho's cock, brushing his hair out of his face before he took him fully in his mouth.

Ohno, standing next to him, kissing him, sucking at hot flesh, his cock heavy in Sho's hand.

Sho, pounding into Nino from behind, groaning into Ohno's mouth as Nino tightened around him.

Nino, flat on his back, sucking on Ohno's neck, bucking up into Sho's hand on his cock.

Sho's mouth on Ohno's cock, licking, slurping, sucking, Ohno's tongue tangling with Nino's.

The tight heat of Ohno's body around him, Nino's high moan as Ohno's hand squeezed and tugged.

Ohno, thrusting upward into Nino, twisting sideways to kiss Sho, Sho moaning and moving with Nino's grip.

Sho couldn't keep track of it anymore. It was too much, too much. Too many hands, too many mouths, too many cocks, legs and asses and elbows and necks and a dozen other body parts he had never realized felt this good. Except that too much, it turned out, was just the right amount. He didn't know whose was which and where it belonged, but in the midst of the heat and the chaos, it was always the three of them. Three. It was a good number.

  
A single full size bed wasn't meant to be occupied by three grown men, Sho found as an elbow jabbed him sharply in the gut. He smacked it away tiredly and got a sharper jab from the other side.

"So," Nino said, turning, smacking his foot against Sho's calf, "the sex was hot, but it's going to be a hell of a challenge trying to fall asleep like this."

"It's so warm in here," Ohno muttered, turning away and nearly falling off the bed, Sho's arm around his waist reeling him back in.

"You know, I read somewhere that threesomes are most common in winter because that's when people depend most on body heat."

"Bullshit." Nino slapped at Sho's shoulder, his hand landing with a tacky smack.

"But you know," Sho said, squirming to lie flat on his back, wiggling his arms around Ohno's and Nino's shoulders and pulling them in, "I kind of like this."

"Shut up, Sho-san. You're not cool just because you're in the middle." Sho could feel Ohno's breath as he laughed quietly into his neck, a playful bite on his shoulder from Nino.

Sho smiled and closed his eyes.

  
**twelve.**

Sho was, predictably, the first to wake up. He found himself curled into Nino, Nino's head against his cheek and Nino's hair tickling his nose. He dropped a kiss to the top of Nino's head, reaching down to place his hand over Ohno's where it had draped itself across his hip.

It was another hour before he felt fingers pinching at his cheek, tugging him back into consciousness. Nino had woken up, apparently, and wanted the world to know it.

"You suck, Nino." He carefully massaged his cheek with his fingers.

"You do, too. Not bad for a first timer." Sho rolled his eyes and turned, shaking Ohno awake.

"Five more minutes, Mom," he muttered. Nino reached across Sho and pinched Ohno's nose shut. Ohno's mouth fell open.

"Wake up, Ohno-san. Today's my last day here."

  
Sho came back from the bathroom to find Ohno and Nino slumped together on the couch, just like old times. He stopped in the kitchen to get a glass of water.

"Satoshi-kun seems really tired today."

Nino hummed, petting Ohno's hair. "It's because we had so much sex yesterday."

"Sex?" Ohno asked, suddenly more alert.

Sho chuckled, sipping from his glass. "Where does this guy get his stamina, seriously? I don't think I'll be able to get it up for a week."

"Weak," Nino said, fixing him with judging eyes.

"It's because you're always sexing it up with your econ reading, Sho-kun. Be careful not to get a paper cut."

Nino cackled, and Sho gurgled into his glass, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. "I don't even know how to respond to that."

"Ohno-san wins today," Nino said proudly. "But no sex, unfortunately," smiling apologetically at Ohno. "I don't have time."

Sho placed his cup in the sink and walked toward the couch. "You have something you have to do?"

Nino nodded gravely. "I have to go buy a TV."

  
They went to Nino's apartment to inspect the damage. After shoving open the door (which was, in fact, heavier than their own door, as Nino had stated once in a lame, lame attempt to justify his constant presence in their apartment), they trickled in to find the unfortunate remains of a monstrous television, the screen shattered and its insides spilling out like guts. Nino had declined to say why the television had met such a sad fate, but Sho suspected it had something to do with the GameCube controller peeking out from the wreckage, away from its companions on the other side of the room. Sho made a mental note not to underestimate Nino's throwing abilities.

"So," he said, watching Ohno poke at the television with his foot, "this is a really old TV, right?"

"Nope," Nino said matter-of-factly. "Brand new. Probably cost a buttload of money."

Sho looked at Nino, blinked, and then returned his attention to the television. Ohno was crouching in front of it, looking at its innards, a fascinated smile growing on his face.

"And," Sho continued slowly, "how were you planning on paying for it?"

"Oh, you know. Prostitution."

"You don't have any money, do you?!"

  
After Nino admitted that he _did_ have money, all in the form of 500-yen coins, Sho irately offered to lend him money on the condition that Nino "fucking [grew] some balls" and "[stopped] getting pissy with expensive electronic equipment". Sho wasn't satisfied until Nino straight-faced agreed, unironically and unsarcastically.

He drove for once, because as good as the public transportation system was in Tokyo, it was not a good idea for three exhausted college students to try to carry a giant television around through the subway system in the middle of the summer. Nino, the smartass, had offered to drive since apparently driving under the influence of extreme emotions was dangerous, but when Sho had turned to him with the coldest smile he could muster, Nino had had the good sense to let it go.

It actually didn't take long for them to find a decent television for a decent price, so after they mentally marked their territory, they spent the rest of the afternoon looking at the display models of fancy electronics and kitchen appliances. Somewhere along the way, they had started guessing at the wattage of the appliances, Sho becoming the arbitrary judge when the sales clerk apologized and explained that she didn't know the wattage for every single item in the store but that she would be happy to see if there was someone who did know. No, Sho assured her, raising an eyebrow in Ohno's direction, that will be quite all right, but thank you very much for your time.

"Since when have you been a wise guy, huh?" Sho asked, quirking his lips at Ohno disappointedly.

"Someone must have a really bad influence on him," Nino suggested. "You should confiscate his phone and make sure he only hangs out with good kids."

"I don't want to hear it from you!"

  
At the end of the day, with the new television deposited safely at the apartment, they walked to the train station together, meandering through side streets and playing with their shadows in the setting summer sun.

"You really didn't have to see me off," Nino said, rolling his suitcase toward the platform.

"Nah, we wanted to," Sho said. He watched as Ohno stepped forward and whispered something in Nino's ear, eliciting a grin and a nod.

Ohno stepped back again. "Are you going to visit again next year? Want to come on vacation with us?"

Nino drew his eyebrows together in thought. "You know, I actually don't think I'll be visiting next year. Ah," he said, waving his wrist, "that doesn't mean I won't see you again. I'll be back, don't worry."

Nino leaned forward and kissed Ohno briefly before turning to Sho. Sho leaned forward expectantly, but Nino held out his hand. Sho grimaced and Nino laughed.

"All right, all right," Nino said, drawing his hand back. Sho stepped forward and kissed Nino full on the lips for as long as he could manage, until Nino stepped back, breathing a little heavily. "Well, thank you for that. And for the money for the TV."

Sho offered his hand, and Nino shook it. "Thank you for everything."

Nino smiled, a little embarrassed, and turned toward the platform. "Remember not to be an asshole to Ohno-san."

Sho looked at Ohno and smiled. "I won't."

"And if you ever get lonely and your econ reading isn't enough for you, give me a call. You have my number."

Wait, did he?

"I'll be back soon!" Nino said, waving.

Sho and Ohno called back in unison. "Have a safe trip!"

  
After they watched Nino's train leave, they turned around and headed back toward the apartment.

"So d'you think that everything that's happened these past two weeks was just a ploy to get money for the TV?"

Sho chuckled. "It wouldn't surprise me."

  
"Hey," Ohno said, stepping into the apartment and wiggling out of his shoes.

"Hm?" Sho braced himself against a wall as he slipped his own shoes off.

"So I know this is a weird time to bring it up, but about that night two years ago, when I was drunk..."

Sho looked up, watching Ohno's face carefully. That was the night that started it all, at least for Sho. "You remembered, huh?"

"A while ago."

Sho nodded, stepping into slippers and walking into the living room. "You started watching me a lot, after Korea."

"I've always been watching you, Sho-kun." Sho stopped walking. "It just took you a long time to notice."

Sho sighed, running his hand through his hair a few times as he looked out the window. Nino was out there, somewhere, braving the heat of a stuffy train as he headed back home. Sho turned back to Ohno, who was looking at him with clear eyes, eyes that grew light and dark, that sometimes filled with remorse and contempt and affection and tears, but in the end hadn't changed at all over the past thirteen years. He stepped forward and placed a small kiss on Ohno's mouth, smiling as he pulled back. "We've got some stuff to talk about, huh?"

  
**thirteen.**

Another summer, another summer vacation. Sho had, as always, wanted to leave in the early morning, somewhere in the time between night and day when the cicadas had stopped chirping but the sun wasn't yet making everything melt into the ground where it stood. But that morning, like most mornings, Ohno had rolled over in bed and grumbled into his pillow, and Sho hadn't had the heart to make him get up quite yet.

Besides, they had time to spare. Living with Ohno for three and a half years had taught him all he needed to know about scheduling, at least when Ohno was concerned: the later, the better. After all, carrying luggage for two was easier when he wasn't also carrying the person carrying the second piece of luggage. So Sho had no choice but to calibrate to Ohno's internal clock, which started several hours after his own did.

He whiled away the hours by catching up on the news. It had been a busy last few weeks, dedicated to finalizing all of his plans for the remainder of his senior year, and he'd barely had time to make love to his choice newspapers, now laid out scintillatingly on the floor in front of the couch. He supposed, though, that he was fortunate enough to have been able to make love otherwise, with an even more scintillating partner, and that was probably good enough for him.

At that moment, the devil himself poked his head out of the bedroom door and padded into the kitchen, fully dressed. "Good morning, Sho-kun."

"Good morning, Satoshi-kun. You're not going to brush your teeth?"

"Ah." Realization sparkled in Ohno's eyes, and he shuffled toward the bathroom, mumbling to himself and scratching his leg.

Sho chuckled. He had returned to leafing through his papers when suddenly a hand dropped onto his shoulder. He turned his head in inquiry, planting his cheek where Ohno's lips were waiting for it. Ohno stood up straight and smiled.

"Good morning, Sho-kun," he said quietly.

Sho rolled his eyes in feigned annoyance. "You already said that." He smiled at Ohno's pout. "Now go get ready. We'll be leaving soon."

He watched Ohno retreat into the bathroom and took the chance to check the locks on the windows and doors. After he was done, he hovered in front of the bathroom door, listening to Ohno hum an upbeat melody around his toothbrush. Sho wondered for a moment when he'd gotten to be so creepy and sentimental, but it was a passing thought at best -- he knew that even now, he could blame most things on Nino.

Ohno opened the door and looked at him curiously, and Sho couldn't even pretend he was there for any other reason. He grabbed Ohno's wrist and tugged him forward, catching him properly on the lips, threading his fingers through Ohno's hair as the kiss deepened. He pulled back, a little breathless. "Ready?"

"Let's go!" Ohno hollered, punching his fist into the air, a dead serious expression on his face despite his flushed cheeks. Sho threw his head back and laughed.

"Look, I already put the luggage by the door. I'm so good to you, huh?" Sho elbowed Ohno's side conspiratorially as they walked to the door.

"I can do things for myself, you know," Ohno retorted sullenly.

Sho wrapped his arm around Ohno's shoulders, slipping his shoes on with practiced efficiency. "I know, I know."

Just as Sho reached over to turn off the lights, his phone chimed in his pocket. He looked up at Ohno and nodded in apology, swiftly fishing his phone out. It wasn't like they were in a hurry, really, but it was probably bad form for him to be the one keeping them from leav--

He looked at the display cautiously, pausing for a beat, before he flipped the phone open to read the message from "The Coolest Person You Will Ever Know".

_Go get 'em, tiger!_

Sho huffed in amusement. "Nino says hi," he relayed. He watched Ohno's face soften and fill with fondness as he hummed in acknowledgment and mumbled nostalgically, "It's been a while."

The jealousy was brief, and it dulled as soon as it hit. It was Nino, after all. It was because of Nino that Sho was who he was, that they were who they were, in a twisted kind of way that didn't make a whole lot of sense logically but still felt right.

Sho had come to realize over the past year that he owed Nino quite a bit. It was almost as if Nino had been Sho's guardian angel, or maybe just a regular old guy, sent to get Sho's head unstuck from where it had been lodged up his ass for years. He was a happier, better man because of Nino, whatever it was he did that made everything work out for them. He would never say as much, of course -- no doubt Nino would brush it off with a sarcastic comment or gloat about it as long as they both should live -- but he at least owed him _something_.

Sho pressed a few buttons and sent a reply before flipping his phone shut. It was simple, one of those messages that showed up automatically when he selected the right characters. Not the most special thing in the world, but it would do for now.

_Thanks._

Sho slipped the phone back into his pocket and looked up to see Ohno standing in front of him, a small, encouraging smile on his face. Sho switched off the lights and grabbed Ohno's hand, yanking him out into the corridor.

They stopped short. Boxes upon boxes littered the walkway, stacked up along the walls. In the middle of it all was a familiar brown rolling suitcase perched in front of the neighboring apartment door. Sho looked up at Ohno, who looked back at him, seeming just as confused. Stepping gingerly around the boxes, Sho pounded twice with his fist before heaving the door open and yelling, "Nino?"

All he got in response was the sound of tape being peeled off boxes. That, and some muffled shouting. "Don't be late for your flight, dumbass! I'll be here when you guys get back!"

Sho's chest swelled. He grinned stupidly and looked at Ohno, who grinned back.

"We'll be back soon!" Ohno yelled loudly, giddily.

"I'm not your fucking housewife and I refuse to respond to that!"

The door slammed closed behind them with a sharp bang and their luggage rolled along the ground with thuds and clunks. But all Sho could hear was Ohno's bubbling laughter and the beat of his own heart as they walked together into the sticky summer heat.


End file.
